


Absolutely

by TardisInWonderland



Series: Storybrooke in Song [3]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-17
Updated: 2013-02-17
Packaged: 2017-11-29 15:44:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/688657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TardisInWonderland/pseuds/TardisInWonderland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adrian Gold fell in love when he was sixteen years old...<br/>Based on the song "Absolutely," aka "The Story of a Girl" by Nine Days.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Absolutely

\----------------------------------------------------------

_This is the story of a girl_  
Her pretty face she hid from the world  
And while she looks so sad and lonely there  
I absolutely love her… 

\----------------------------------------------------------

Adrian Gold fell in love when he was sixteen years old.

Granted, he didn’t know it at the time, and not for a long time after, but he did fall in love, and years later he would be able to pinpoint the very moment on the very day.

They’d been friends since they were little, the death of her mother only bringing them closer together. Adrian’s parents had divorced years before and his mother had simply ceased all communication after losing the custody case, so he only lived with his father as well. Maurice bonded with him over the loss of their wives, and it meant that Belle and Adrian spent quite a bit more time together, over dinner and studying, out at the bookshop, and generally talking. A death wasn’t the same as a divorce, but it was nice to have someone around who relatively understood.

Never did anyone mention the fact that Adrian’s family obviously had money, while Belle’s family obviously did not. He’d share his lunch with her when she didn’t have anything to eat, and the winter that she came to school without a coat she’d found a surprise package on her porch the next morning. She walked around in a bright yellow, wool pea coat all winter. 

On the other side of things, Belle was the brave one of the pair. She was younger because she’d skipped two grades, but that didn’t mean she was weak. Adrian was small and skinny for his age, and he was an easy target for bullies… or so they thought. The first week of the sixth grade someone had slammed him against the lockers, and probably would have punched him, too, but they never actually got there. The boy left with a broken nose and Belle and Adrian served detention together for the next month (They hadn’t been suspended because Adrian took the blame for the broken nose, saying he acted in self-defense, and Belle supposedly only threw the kid off of Adrian. The principal probably didn’t believe them, but that was alright).

She still didn’t smile as often as she should even though there was a quirky little grin reserved for only him, still let her hair fall over her right eye just a little when it wasn’t tucked behind her ear, no matter how long or short it was, still had reading glasses when her eyes were tired, and she still wore clothes that were just a little too big for her. The only difference was her age, and the fact that she was now considered one of the prettiest, most popular people in the school, and Adrian… Adrian was not.

They were outside in the near-June heat for their general PE class, playing soccer. He’d noticed that she was slowing down, not her usual perky self, and had finally stopped altogether. Adrian ran over to her just in time for her to look up, eyes unfocused, trying to mumble an explanation.

“Adrian…” 

And fourteen-year-old Isabella French collapsed into his arms.

She wasn’t unconscious, but she was definitely unable to walk, so he carried her to the side of the field as one of the teachers rushed over. 

“Dizzy,” she panted, leaning back into his arms.

Her pulse was high- far too high. The school called an ambulance and they rushed her to the hospital. It turned out that something was wrong with her heart, an electrical problem. Adrian and his father had driven straight to the hospital after school- Belle’s father was out of town for the weekend, and they were the secondary emergency contact. Belle was released to go home with them the next morning, under strict instructions to bring her back if it happened again.

“What did they say it was?” Adrian asked.

“A short PR interval,” Belle said, fingering the inside of her right elbow absentmindedly. They’d given the poor girl every drug test in the book and a few more besides, done an echo, and taken an EKG, but they couldn’t find anything physically wrong with her. “According to the cardiologist, it means that my heart has a secondary electrical pathway that makes it contract in the wrong way, and then my body gets less oxygen pumping through, so it beats way too fast to compensate.”

For the life of him, Adrian didn’t understand how Belle had picked that explanation out of the medical jargon that they had told his father, but then again she’d always been ridiculously smart for her age. 

Brian, his father, finally voiced the question he’d been thinking.

“How did you pick all that out, dearie?” Father and son shared the same Scottish brogue, but what Adrian didn’t catch onto was his father’s endearments. It sounded so strange to him for a fourteen-year-old to call anyone “dearie,” but it worked for his father. 

“They broke it down for me,” she shrugged.

“And you still have that referral paper, right?”

“Yes, Brian.” Belle smiled weakly. It was probably the tenth time he’d asked her. The nurse had given her a referral to cardiology practice that could examine her over a more long-term basis, along with a fair warning that there might not be much they could do.

Adrian prayed they were wrong.

However, it was the night that Belle stayed over at their house that everything changed. They didn’t have a spare bedroom, but she insisted that she was fine with the couch, and she and Adrian wound up sitting downstairs into the wee hours watching old black-and-white movies with her. Adrian’s father had gone to bed at about 10:00 in preparation to get up for yard work tomorrow, but he trusted the kids enough to stay up without him and not cause any trouble. Adrian might have been scrawny and generally unpleasant around most people, but he was smart and a good kid, and Belle was his oldest friend. 

They were sitting under a blanket in the middle of the sofa, closer than strictly necessary and shoulders touching.

“Adrian?” Belle asked, obviously wondering if he was still awake at 2AM. 

“Yeah?” 

“I’m scared.” She adjusted to lean against him, resting her head on his shoulder. He was rigid with shock for a moment, but relaxed soon and slipped an arm around her, hugging her close.

“Me too,” he admitted. “But you’re going to be ok.”

“How do you know?”

“Because we’re always ok.”

From scrapes and bruises to broken bones, from bullies and blunders to bloody noses, and even through death, they always managed to scrape through. The truth was, though, that they were only teenagers, and they knew it. They probably hadn’t seen the half of it yet.

And Isabella French fell asleep leaning against Adrian Gold’s shoulder, and that was the night he fell in love with her.

\----------------------------------------------------------

_How many lovers would stay_  
Just to put up with this shit day after day?  
How do we wind up this way  
Watching our mouths for the words that we say? 

\----------------------------------------------------------

Throughout high school, Adrian and Isabella ran in different circles. It didn’t change the fact that they still ate lunch together every day, Belle abandoning her usual crowd to go over and sit beside him, or the fact that they still rode home from school together, or ate dinner with their dads every Friday night.

Adrian still kept a check on her heart problem- the cardiologist still didn’t know _exactly_ what was wrong, and they might never know. Sometimes she still had trouble with it, but she knew what to do and could catch it before things became too serious.

What did change, though, was that Brian remarried. Her name was Elizabeth, and she was a friend to both Adrian and Belle. Adrian liked her best of all because she told him that she wasn’t going to try to mother him if he didn’t want her to, but she’d happily be there for him with whatever he needed. To both of them, she was like an eccentric aunt coming into their tiny family. She helped Belle through her first period and answered all the questions that she didn’t want to ask her dad, and she was the closest thing to a mother that Adrian had ever had.

Most of all, she made his father smile, and that was worth anything.

What also changed was that Belle started to date.

The first time he heard about it was like a stab in the heart, but he didn’t say anything. Seeing them together was worse. Everywhere they went they were holding hands, or God forbid, _kissing_. He was on edge for days until he finally told himself that he’d have to reel everything in or risk going completely insane. At the time he simply thought he needed a life, needed more friends than just one girl. 

She spent more time with August and less with Adrian, and in a way it killed him. The only thing that kept him going was her smile. She smiled at August sometimes, but he knew her well enough to see that it didn’t reach her eyes. Adrian could still make her laugh, and that small reassurance that she still wanted him around was more than he could ever want.

So he watched as boyfriends came and went, and he picked up a girlfriend himself, once. Her name was Milah- nice enough, but the one time that they went on a double date both Belle and Adrian wound up feeling like their dates weren’t actually out with them. He was pretty sure their significant others were shagging behind their backs, but he wasn’t about to say so.

He wanted to punch her current bastard of a boyfriend- Killian whatshisface- but he knew she wouldn’t let him. She did, however, let him walk her home, and they stayed on the front porch swing and talked in the warm summer night, the creaking of the rusty swing the only sound.

“You know, I keep thinking that maybe sometime I’ll get it right,” she said suddenly.

“Get what right?”

“This,” she gestured around aimlessly. “Dating. Relationships. _Life_. I just can’t do anything right, can I?” 

“Don’t be stupid- of course you can, love. And it’s not your fault he’s a… there’s not actually a decent word for that, so I’ll stop before you slap me.” That was another thing that changed. Sixteen-year-old Adrian didn’t use endearments, but eighteen-year-old Adrian did. 

Sometimes.

With the right people.

Belle gave a tiny smile at his last comment before Adrian continued.

“You’re smart and beautiful, and I’ve never met anyone who can read fluent Latin,” he was babbling, but it worked. Belle giggled a little at the last comment.

“Can you do something for me?” she asked, leaning against him on the swing, not unlike the late nights spent on Adrian’s sofa watching old movies.

“Of course.”

“If this is wrong… pretend it never happened?” Belle looked up, the expression in her blue eyes pleading. He opened his mouth to ask what on earth she was talking about, but he was cut off by a kiss.

Kiss.

She was _kissing_ him. 

It happened so fast that he wasn’t able to form a coherent though when she looked at him again. He didn’t know what to think, what to feel, what to _do_ … So when Belle mumbled a frightened apology and scurried inside the house, he was left on the porch, confused and alone.

Why did he feel like he wanted to kiss her again?

That was the night that he realized he loved her.

\----------------------------------------------------------

_As long as she stands there waiting_  
Wearing the holes in the soles of her shoes  
Now how many days disappear  
When you look in the mirror  
So how do you choose 

\----------------------------------------------------------

Nothing else came of that kiss for far too long. They spent the last month before graduation in an awkward sort of limbo land between talking and not talking, feeling and not feeling. Neither one of them could bring themselves to say what needed to be said.

Somewhere along the way Adrian broke up with Milah and Belle very publicly dumped Killian for cheating on her… multiple times. If he remembered correctly, she’d poured a pitcher of iced tea over Jones’ head.

When summer came they started jobs on opposite sides of town, Belle working at Granny’s Diner and Adrian helping Tilman with repairs around town. In the fall they went off to classes

It wasn’t until Belle’s twenty-second birthday that anything else happened between them.

They were both home from college on summer break, Belle studying library sciences and Adrian majoring in business. Neither of them had really bothered to keep up with much of the town while they were away- Storybrooke was changing around them, and they were lost in the mix. Belle’s father was out of town, so she had planned on spending her birthday alone.

Adrian was the only one who remembered.

When he came to the front door she was inside, sipping a glass of wine and reading from a thick book. She was surprised, to say the least, but happy for the company.

“So...”

“So.”

Belle poured a second glass and they sipped in companionable silence. If he didn’t know better, he’d say it was almost like old times.

But no. 

They were no longer fourteen or seventeen or eighteen, and he knew there was no way she would ever want him. It had taken far too long for him to realize what he should have done, but now it was too late. 

“I miss you,” she said with a sigh, placing her empty glass on the coffee table. “College is lonely.”

He didn’t know how to respond, so he simply stayed silent. There was a tiny flicker of hope threatening to come to life, and he needed to squash it before it became any stronger. It wasn’t helping that flicker when Belle curled against him like a cat, resting her head on his chest in a slightly altered version of how she used to lean into him when they sat together.

“I’m sure you’ve got better friends than me, love.” He forced himself to chuckle, and Belle looked up, clearly confused.

“And yet… look at the only person in town who remembered my birthday.”

“Ah, that reminds me,” he shifted slightly to pull a box out of his jacket pocket. “I brought your present.”

“Oh, no… Adrian-” Somehow he always managed to sneak some kind of lavish (well, not always lavish, but always far too much from Belle’s view) gift under her nose.

“Don’t ‘Adrian’ me, love. You know I had to get you something.” He pulled out a small box with a lopsided smile, and pressed it into her hands. She opened it gingerly, almost afraid to see what was inside.

“Oh my… this is too much.” Her eyes went wide. Inside the box was a rose pendant on a delicate silver chain.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Adrian smiled even more, lifting out his present to fasten it around her neck. His fingers ghosted over her skin, pulling her hair out of the way and trailing across her neck he clasped it shut. It was probably the closest she’d ever let him be to her, but in that moment he could almost imagine- almost- that she was really his. That she didn’t want to be with anyone else, that she didn’t let anyone else touch her this way.

He must have been enjoying this notion a bit too much, because he was sure he felt her shiver. Belle reached up with one hand to finger the pendant gently, the other one drawing circles on the couch cushions.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Somehow in the course of Belle looking up and Adrian looking down, their lips brushed, only briefly. She seemed to gauge his reaction for a moment, then leaned forward and kissed him again.

And this time he kissed her back.

He drew her closer to him, not daring to place his hands anywhere out of line, but she kept moving until she was sitting in his lap, nails scratching gently at his scalp and playing with the ends of his hair. He pulled away from her only for a moment to trail kisses down her neck and along the collar of her shirt, Belle’s breathing coming in short gasps.

“Adrian…” she began, but her next words were only a mumble.

“What, love?” He looked up, soft brown eyes finding her clear blue ones.

“That’s what I was going to say,” she whispered. “I love you.”

He couldn’t do anything besides kiss her again.

“And I love you,” Adrian whispered between kisses. “You don’t know how long I’ve wanted to tell you that.”

They met more often after that.

Every time they came home from college, and a few others besides, over the next two years. Belle obtained her Master’s Degree in Library Sciences, and one day… one day he came over and she was crying. Her father was out of town again, and she was in her attic bedroom (chosen because she liked the sunlight) two stories above him, trying not to make a sound even though there was no one here to hear if she screamed.

“What’s wrong? Belle, please. Talk to me.” He walked over to sit beside her on the edge of her bed.

“I don’t know what to do…” she stammered.

“What? Go back a second,” Adrian crooned. “Talk slowly. Breathe.” 

She stammered out a short story about a job offer at a huge library system. The pay was fantastic, and it came with an apartment over the library. She’d be able to get a good start there.

“It’s in Virginia. It was an offer through the college,” Belle sniffed. “But I don’t want to leave, I want to stay here- I want to be with you.” 

“Shhh, love. Come here.” He wrapped his arms around her, trying to calm her down. They stayed like that for several minutes, until Belle was calm enough to think coherently and Adrian had reasoned through things. “I think you should take it,” he said softly.

“ _What_?!” She forgot about being quiet, practically yelling in his face. 

“Listen to me. You’re always talking about adventure and seeing the world, and this is your chance to get you of here.” If she found a life in Storybrooke- made a life with _him_ in Storybrooke- she wouldn’t ever leave. As much as he wanted her to stay with him, he wouldn’t hold her back. He wouldn’t dare.

“But-”

“If you didn’t want to go at least a little then you wouldn’t feel so conflicted about it,” Adrian insisted. “Go. And then I’ll go with you sometime, and if not… I’ll be here waiting for you if you ever decide to come back.”

“You don’t want me to stay?” She sounded crushed. 

“I want you with me more than anything in the world, but you know what they say… if you love something, set her free.” Adrian finally released her, and she tilted her head up to look at him.

“I love you, too.” 

She kissed him, and the kiss led to fumbling fingers and gentle touches, and clothes on the floor and reassurance that _yes_ , they both wanted this- skin on skin, holding and caressing, and ending up in a tangle of limbs on her bed. And if he couldn’t have her forever, he could at least hold her now and know that she wasn’t going anywhere, not just yet, that she was happy to be here in his arms for the meantime.

\----------------------------------------------------------

_How many days in a year_  
She woke up with hope  
But she only found tears  
And I can be so insincere  
Making her promises never for real 

\----------------------------------------------------------

He lost contact with her after she obtained her degree. She moved somewhere for a job- librarians weren’t exactly in high demand, even in Storybrooke. The old library hadn’t been used in years, and the town didn’t have the money to repair it. Her father gave him an address to write to, but there was never any response, and all his letters were returned. It didn’t stop him from sending them, though.

He tried to call her several times, but nothing. No response, and the one time he did get a response was because he dialed the number wrong. She obviously just didn’t want to have anything to do with him. 

There was an engagement announcement in the papers one day for Isabella French and George Gaston, less than a year after she last saw him. The announcement might as well have ripped his heart from his chest. Adrian remembered him- they’d gone to school together, and he’d worked for her father’s flower shop. Maurice was always trying to get them together, and it seemed that it had finally worked. It disturbed him, though, that Belle didn’t look happy in the picture accompanying the announcement. She wasn’t smiling- she almost never smiled, he thought…

Not for anyone but Adrian Gold.

Maybe they’d pushed too far, the last time they’d been together. Maybe it was too fast. Whatever happened, he certainly regretted it.

Brian’s health slowly declined, and Adrian gradually took over more and more of the jobs that his father used to do, including running the pawn shop and collecting the rent. Elizabeth cared for him in his old age, and they were happy together regardless of how little time they might have left.  
He dated a few women over the years, but his heart wasn’t in it. They were a distraction, something to keep his mind off the person he wanted the most. He’d even proposed to one of them- Milah, that he’d dated for a while back in high school- just to try to force himself to move on. They say absence makes the heart grow fonder, but this was ridiculous. Absence was one thing, and a gaping wound that simply wouldn’t heal over was entirely another.

That was when he realized how _much_ he loved her, and that he would likely never stop loving her.

But she has likely stopped loving him.

Then came the day that Belle returned, not for a day or for an hour, but for good.

She came back quietly, moved into a little apartment quietly, restored the library and ran it quietly…

Raised her son quietly.

Her son. She had a son. It didn’t matter how quietly Belle went about her life- if her presence was enough to turn his world upside down, then the boy set it in a kind of constant spinning motion. He didn’t know what to think any longer, with the woman he loved happily raising a son fathered by another man.

There was one day at the library, though, that he thought she might still care for him, at least a little. He came in just to browse, more to see her than anything, and found her leaning against a bookshelf with her eyes shut, taking slow breaths.

Trying his best not to startle her, he walked over slowly, gently taking her arm.

“You should sit down,” he said quietly. He knew what was wrong- he was the only one who would know what was wrong. Belle only nodded, leaning on him slightly.

“How did you know?”

“You always look like that when your heart acts up.” He didn’t realize the slip until far too late- he still remembered exactly what her actions were even after ten years, and now she knew.

“It’s good to see you, Adrian,” she said softly, shifting her grip to hold his hand. 

“Come on now, lo- dearie. Sit.” He guided her over to a chair at the side of the room. Belle looked at him with confusion, eyes slightly unfocused.

“Dearie?”

\----------------------------------------------------------

_Well your clothes never wear as well the next day  
And your hair never falls in quite the same way  
But you never seem to run out of things to say_

\----------------------------------------------------------

There was a party at town hall that spring (the only place in town that was big enough to throw a party) for Milah’s birthday. For the life of him, he didn’t know why anyone had invited Belle, but she’d shown up. The whole town had shown up, actually. Belle sat at a table with Mary Margaret Blanchard and Ruby Lucas, smiling her sad little smile that he knew meant absolutely nothing.

He happened to walk by their table once, and heard Miss Lucas mention something about Milah’s engagement, and about the possibility she was already pregnant. The pregnancy was news to Adrian- he’d never _touched_ Milah. The very thought was… not revolting, but not pleasant, either. He didn’t actually think about consummating their marriage before now, actually. She was, as we’ve said before, a distraction to him, an illusion of something for brighter and bigger.  
Belle, however, went ashen.

“Excuse me,” she mumbled, and dashed out the door. Adrian’s resolve lasted all of a minute and a half before he slipped out the door to find her. She didn’t want him. She couldn’t want him…

It wasn’t until he heard muffled sobbing coming from a closet at the far 

“How could you do this?!” she cried, gesturing to the door.

“Do what, dearie?” Gold asked, feigning innocence. He couldn’t have hurt her. She was married with a child- she didn’t need him any longer.

“No,” she shook her head, a humorless laugh leaving her throat. “No, Adrian Gold, you do not call me ‘dearie.’ Your father called me that- you call me _love_!” 

It was a good thing that the doors in this place were solid, and that the others were down several rooms. Otherwise, the entire town might have heard her outburst. Belle stood firm, facing him, tears in her eyes. He refused to move, refused to speak, refused to say anything that might give him away.

“Or at least you used to.” The words were barely audible, but they cut like a knife.

“Not anymore, dearie.” It almost physically pained him to say it, but he straightened his jacket, trying to cover up how uncomfortable he was.

“You can’t even tell me that you don’t love me! What happened, Adrian? What changed?”

“Nothing at all,” he answered smoothly, but he couldn’t bring himself to look her in the eye. It was the truth, in a way. Nothing had changed in that he still loved her, and everything had changed in that she didn’t want him, and it hurt. 

It was ridiculous to try to pretend that he didn’t feel anything after so long, but he was stubborn and prideful, and he didn’t want to admit to himself that Belle would never be happy with someone like him. She needed someone… better. Yes, that was it. Better.

Whatever he’d done all those years ago, he would never manage to make up for it. 

That was the point in the conversation when she finally slapped him, anger blazing in her eyes.

“You bloody liar,” Belle breathed. “You stupid, childish, _unfaithful_ , lying bastard!”

He was so surprised that he didn’t speak- when Belle was properly angry, she was one of the scariest people that he knew. 

“I never stopped- I never stopped loving you, not for a single bloody second, do you know that? I don’t care what you say. I know you’re lying.”  
Adrian stood, frozen in shock, only one word running through his mind.

What?

When he finally looked up, there were hot tears streaming down her cheeks, but she still faced him with as much courage as she could muster. It broke his heart. Belle didn’t cry- his Belle didn’t cry… and she was crying because of him.

Could she really…?

“Fine,” she threw up her hands in defeat, preparing to leave. “Fine, do whatever you want. Get married. Have a life. Just don’t expect me to be waiting on you to come back.”

She walked out of the room, slamming the door behind her, but Gold was on her heels in seconds.

“Belle, wait-”

“I’ve waited on you _ten years_ , Adrian!” She whirled around to face him. “I’m done waiting on you. Bae is done waiting on you.”  
He stopped dead in his tracks, confusion clouding his features.

“Bae?”

“Your _son_ ,” she snapped. “ _Our_ son.”

“He’s… mine?” Adrian stepped just a little closer, as quickly as he dared. He felt lightheaded. It was one time, all those years ago, but the boy was the right age, and once was enough…

“Of course he’s yours! There’s never been anyone else-” She cut off with a muffled cry as Adrian came forward and crushed her against him in a desperate kiss.

“Adrian…”she panted, half-heartedly pushing him away. “Please. Please stop.” 

He did, slowly, but he wouldn’t let go of her. After all this time she was back, and he wasn’t about to let her go so easily.

“All those years…” she said quietly. “No contact, not even a word…”

“What?” Adrian shook his head in disbelief. “Belle, I sent you a thousand letters, tried to call you a hundred times, but nothing.” She was just as confused as he was.

“But my dad said-”

“Your father said-”

Realization suddenly dawned on them. It was Maurice the whole time, keeping them apart. Well, maybe not _solely_ him, Belle thought. George was probably involved, too. But neither of them had ever expected her pregnancy to come along.

Naturally, her father had assumed it was George, but Belle’s fiancé knew better. He left her (more like kicked her out) and sent her crawling along with her child to put her life back together, and ten years later she had finally made her way back to Storybrooke.

For the life of her, she could never figure out why her father had been so dead-set against their relationship. They’d been friends for years, and if Maurice happened to cut a wary glance in his direction once or twice, then he’d tried to ignore it, but… when Belle told him that they were seeing each other, her father had blown a gasket.

 _He’s not right for you, he’s not good enough for you, he’s not the kind of person you want._ All those things had been tossed around one afternoon until Belle had finally screamed back that it was her life, and no matter how much she loved her father, he couldn’t make choices for her.

All this time she thought Adrian didn’t want anything to do with her, and she’d been so wrong all along.

“So what does this mean?” Belle’s hand found one of his, lacing their fingers together.

“It means we have a lot of things to fix, including the big one down the hall…” he trailed off, nervous. Belle grew rigid in his arms, as expected.

“Why?”

“Because you were happy,” he sighed. “Or, I thought you were. You had a family of your own- I thought you’d gotten married, moved on, and I foolishly came to the conclusion that if I tried to move on even a little, it might help me.”

“Did it?” She looked almost afraid to ask.

“Not a whit. She’s not you, love.” He brushed a strand of hair away from her face, wiping away another tear as it rolled down her cheek.

“But I thought she was…” Belle trailed off, a hand straying to her stomach.

“Pregnant?” Adrian nearly laughed. “She probably is, but not with my child.” It was very likely that she only wanted to marry him for the money, honestly. They’d never gotten farther with each other than drunken kissing, and always with Belle’s name on the tip of his tongue and Adrian feeling like a bastard when he was sober.

“Then she has no clue what she’s missing,” Belle smiled softly and hugged him close.

“And she never will,” Adrian said firmly. As much as he wanted to stay here with Belle in his arms, there were a few matters that needed to be settled first. He took her by the hand and led her back to the main room. Most of the guests were still milling about, congratulating Milah on the wedding in the near future and whispering in quiet little gossip circles. 

Adrian walked directly up Milah, pulling her aside.

Belle couldn’t hear what Adrian was saying, but she heard quite clearly (as did the rest of the room) when Milah shouted from the corner.

“ _WHAT_?” The screech tore through the room like a whirlwind, every person in the room looking towards them. Adrian simply looked smug.

“Yes, well maybe you’ll think twice the next time you sleep with another man while you’re engaged.” He spoke a little louder this time, enough that the entire room could have heard it. Several jaws dropped, and Belle covered her mouth to smother her surprised laugh.

Adrian walked right back over to Belle, crossing the room as quickly as he could without actually running, and kissed her in front of the entire town. Not that she cared, in the end.

“Now, let’s go home, and you can introduce me to my son.”

And Belle smiled.

\----------------------------------------------------------

_This is the story of a girl_  
Who cried a river and drowned the whole world  
And while she looks so sad in photographs  
I absolutely love her  
When she smiles 

\----------------------------------------------------------

**Author's Note:**

> Belle has a short PR interval because I have a short PR interval, so I know how to explain it, and I wanted to write something where Belle was the one with the physical weakness rather than Rum.


End file.
